that is the deficit problem. without entitlement reform there is no amount of growth that will fix it. melissa: christian, isn't this all noise and nonsense until we fix that problem? >> well, not exactly because, you know, when you have an economy that's suffering from high unemployment andd3 stagnating wages you're not at your full productive capacity. once you reach that level as we've seen in the last few months, once you increase revenues whether it comes from tax increases or improved economic conditions, you drastically and very quickly lower your debt position and your deficit position. that should be the first order of business. that is really what we do first before we figure out what is our true remaining structural long-term deficit. melissa: okay, but doug, you're a numbers guy. let's do thisatively, rather than with our emotions. can the economy quantitatively grow enough to deal with paying for our promises for the entitlements and the system that we have laid out? >> no. at the heart of this are p